


Of Bad Dreams and Caresses

by Validity_For_Dissonance



Category: The Great (TV 2020)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-28
Updated: 2020-07-28
Packaged: 2021-03-06 02:00:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,148
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25565515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Validity_For_Dissonance/pseuds/Validity_For_Dissonance
Summary: In which Peter has a nightmare and Catherine has to comfort him.
Relationships: Catherine/Peter III (The Great TV 2020)
Comments: 24
Kudos: 145





	Of Bad Dreams and Caresses

It is after a three-hour long reading session with Orlo and Leo that Catherine retires to her apartments with a thoroughly invigorated mind and a worn-out body. Marial helps her undress, and not before too long, she is in her loose-fitting, soft nightgown, with her hair pulled together in a lazy braid that hangs off one shoulder.

She clambers onto her bed, blows a puff of air to snuff the flame of a candle, and relaxes atop the mattress, a sleepy smile easing its way onto her visage as her eyelids flutter shut.

But of course, Catherine has been cursed to never have a day pan out nicely from start to finish by a spiteful and malefic person who is in regular commune with higher spirits. She strongly suspects Archie.

For just as slumber threatens to quieten her hazy, half-formed thoughts, the doors bellow open at a rather harsh turn of their brass knobs, and she instantly sucks in a shocked breath and straightens into a sitting position. Again, she is alert and focused. Unfortunately, she will likely remain thus for quite a while before she can regain her joyously lax state.

A frown pulls at her lips, and she demands, “Who dares come to my quarters at such an hour?”

A tall figure strides towards her until the moonlight streaming in from the open window illuminates his face. _Ah. Him._

“It’s just me, wife,” Peter says, his tone implying a notable lack of perturbation regarding her _own_ perturbation. 

_However, it must be said…_

Catherine’s vexed frown turns contemplative as she assesses her husband. His eyes are bright, but they shy away from hers, choosing instead to focus on a significantly uninteresting stain marring the carpet. His complexion is ashen, whereas it is usually a healthy, sun-kissed shade of beige. And his shoulders are not pulled back in self-assured arrogance, but are rather caved-in and hunched. And is he… slightly trembling?

“Is something the matter?” she asks, unable to ward off a wave of concern that she dubs as curiosity for the sake of preserving her hypothetical, righteous stance.

Peter releases a breath, short and shuttering, and swallows an invisible lump. His right hand rises to rub at his eye and pinch the bridge of his nose. “I had a dream—a markedly bad one, should the state of my person not provide sufficient proof.” 

His voice is oddly subdued, and his jests sound more jaded than mischievously sarcastic.

There is little evidence to it other than three minutes of exposure and a hunch, but Catherine decides that this Peter is unlike any Peter she has dealt with so far.

And as the ever-dutiful wife that she is not, she lowers her voice to a sympathetic timbre and furrows her eyebrows in worry. “Do you wish to talk about it?”

But his frown deepens and he shakes his head in small repetitive motions, as though compelling the remnants of his nightly tormentors into silence. 

“No, I just—” he pauses, and she waits for a continuation with an eyebrow that is raised in askance, before he makes up his mind and marches towards her with what seems to be single-minded determination.

Peter pulls her covers down to her waist, forcing her to sit up even more as alarm takes hold of her. Many thoughts occur to her in tandem, none of them particularly pleasant, and all involving the various ways her husband can make an already ruined night into something that is worse—the memory of that one time he woke her up so that they could watch serfs balance an apple atop their heads as daggers were thrown at them was still fresh in her mind—but what he does next is baffling beyond anything his undeniable creativity has conjured thus far.

He levels her with a glance that is almost reluctant in its uncertainty, and then slowly, he tips his chin downwards and tucks his head securely against her chest, his arms rising to encircle her about the waist.

Catherine is at a loss for words.

Dumbstruck, she stares ahead in rigid stupor, with hardly a breath escaping her nostrils.

As for Peter, his initial uncertainty vanishes when he holds her, and his frame relaxes from its tense state. He pulls more closely to her, and she is forced to let out her trapped breath.

“A woman’s breasts are a marvelous thing,” he muses in an admittedly weary drawl.

“That so?” she says lightly, even though there are unintelligible screams in her head that are of an obscure origin. Some sound like Marial, some sound like Leo. Most of them sound like her.

He hums. “They’re delightful to suckle, fondle, and apparently sleep on.”

“You’re always full of wise words and astute observations.”

His lips rise in a smile that is quickly smothered as a shadow is cast over his visage. And he makes no comment like _‘I know’_ or _‘In time, dear wife, you might develop your own wisdom, though you would have to accept that it will forever be overshadowed by my own, for I am a fucking genius’._

Something is evidently weighing on him. And her cursed empathy causes her heart to tug painfully, but she will not ponder why she should feel pain on the behalf of a person who tends to inflict it liberally on her and others. 

Well, mostly others, these days… But all the same. The pain of Russians is her own, and indirectly, he hurts her with his every misdeed and misjudgment.

But… right now…

Catherine sighs, her shoulders falling slack. Tentatively, she raises a hand and leaves it to hover atop his hair. Then, slowly, she brings it down in a single caress that starts at the crown of his head and ends at the nape of his neck.

When he closes his eyes and nuzzles her collarbone, she instantly removes her hand as though scalded.

“You don’t have to stop,” he voices quietly. 

“Hm?”

“It feels nice,” Peter admits before he slightly raises his head to look at her. “Mother used to do it all the time.” Then his brow descends and his eyes become dull again. “Or at least, that’s what Aunt Elizabeth says.”

Somehow, Catherine suspects his nightmare has something to do with his mother. Should she probe?

She shouldn’t.

But she will.

“She seems like a very lovely person,” she comments in a manner that allows for any addition with which he might like contribute.

His disposition, already sullen, becomes even more forlorn, though a hint of wistfulness softens his blue eyes and the curve of his downturned lips.

Peter doesn’t speak, choosing instead to snuggle closer to her. And Catherine tells herself that her caresses are a weaponized concession that is meant to prompt him into speech, and not a gesture whose purpose is to bring comfort to a boy that was—is—clearly unloved in the ways that matter the most.

The tips of her fingers play with short strands of dark hair, before her palm eases in a gentle stroke that goes down his head. Peter melts in her arms.

“In many ways,” he admits sluggishly, clearly battling against the pull of a sleeping spell, “You’re everything I wish she was.”

And this hurts her more than it should. 

She stops her hand, though she does not remove it.

Guilt and confounding heartache claim her, because she is everything he wishes his mother was _not._ But here she is, with her deceptive caresses and false warmth, lulling him into a sense of treasonous security so that she can extract whatever information might aid her in her schemes later on.

“Your heart is pounding at an insane speed.” He frowns. “Is this normal?”

She stammers for a moment, but recovers quickly. “Oh—um, that is the effect of having you so close to me. You always have my heart racing, and I must refrain from extensive periods of contact lest I die from a heart attack.”

At that, she grabs his shoulders and pushes him a few inches away from her, noting the surprised disappointment that washes over his features at the sudden loss.

“Oh,” he intones. “Annoying. Although entirely understandable. I have been told that my mere existence causes the death of thousands of people.”

Catherine raises her head to nod, though it never quite descends to complete the gesture. “Right.”

“Well, then.” Peter flops onto the other side of the bed, unaware, or perhaps uncaring, of her incredulous staring, and says, “Let us sleep, dear wife.”

“You’re sleeping here?”

He fluffs a pillow before burying his face in it. “I would invite you to my apartments, as they are larger and more luxurious, but I am fucking tired and they are simply too far away. We’ll have to make do with your own.” 

Then, he furrows his eyebrows and hums in displeasure. “This pillow smells like citrus and pine. Disgusting.” He throws it aside and grabs her own to inhale it, and a smile quickly remedies his demeanor. “Perfect. Jasmine with a hint of vanilla.” And he rests his head atop it.

After a moment’s hesitance, Catherine grabs the discarded pillow and reclines against her own side of the bed, taking in the sight of the person who confounds her with feelings of contempt and fondness.

He opens his eyes to look at her, and they speak of such deep-running emotion that they leave her breathless.

“I don’t understand,” she confides in a whisper. “Don’t you usually go to Grigor and George when you’re upset?”

“Usually, yes,” he says, never breaking the eye-contact. “But as it turns out, you inspire a feeling in me that they do not.”

“… I do?”

Dread pools in her stomach.

“It is the oddest thing. But being near you overwhelms my stomach with nervous flutters and calms my heart at the same time. When I touch you, I feel stray sparks of electricity tingling my fingers—for some reason, I even enjoy it. And when you speak,” his voice drops to a whisper, “I have to hold myself from smiling at everything you say lest I look like a brainless idiot.”

Catherine’s eyes are inexplicably misty, and it seems like her heart has lodged itself in her throat.

Peter’s eyebrows furrow in contemplation. “Do you think this happens to other people, or is it unique to me?”

She forces herself to clear her throat and find her voice. “I suspect an ailment,” she whispers. Her words are not mischievous and conspiring; instead they are laden with alarmed confusion regarding what his feelings might mean for them. “You should consult with Chekhov as soon as you wake.” 

Humming once, he ponders this for a moment. Then a small grin, complete with a tilt of the head, all but taunts her by being so endearing. “Right. I’ll do that.” 

Yet something about him makes her feel like he is not as ignorant as he makes himself out to be.

His right hand reaches for her left hand, which is curled by her pillow, and entwines their fingers loosely together.

When he closes his eyes, she finds herself examining the slope of his nose and the cut of his cheekbones—undeniably refined and handsome. Then there are his lips, which arch into an adorable pout when he sleeps. But nothing in his face bears the markings of the cruel and despicable person she has deemed him to be, and this worries her.

She decides that if she pondered this any further, her heart might compromise the objectivity of her mind—it _must_ be objectivity, must it not?—and so she resolves to shut her eyes and attempt to sleep as well. If she fails, then she will focus on murderous schemes until she tires herself out completely.

But his fingers tighten instinctively around hers. Curiously, she attempts to stroke the back of his hand with a thumb. He smiles. And she curses herself. 

_ Okay. No murderous schemes. Just this one night. _

Catherine draws closer to him until the heat emanating from his body envelops her in a shroud of warmth. 

_It is a cold night, is it not?_

Surely she can be a tad Machiavellian and seek refuge from the sting of a frigid night?

Nodding to herself in approval, she slowly rests her head against his chest, nearly startling when his arms rise to envelop her.

Sleepily, he mumbles, "I thought being close puts you at risk for a heart attack?"

"I'm... habituating my body to yours by intermittent bouts of contact until I become accustomed to your closeness."

Nonsense, when spoken with assured confidence, does have a factual ring to it.

Yet there is a teasing note to his voice when he says, "Science?"

"Science," she concurs with a nod.

Peter pulls her closer and buries his face in her hair.

"Well then, _huzzah_ to science."

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this at 5 am instead of sleeping. Do I regret anything? No, because I love those two and they deserve more fics.  
> 


End file.
